Like this:

Related

12 Responses to “BNP completes five years”

I believe, you are obssessed with Tareque Zia.
I can’t have any good guess how many times you dreamt of or have nightmares with TZ during the last 5 yrs.

You just spinned out the fabrics of failures and sparingly touhced the successes.

You forget the many major events like containing terror, rab and cross fire so on. Also, strings of bombs in 64 districts by militants, nabbing the sheik and Bangla Bhai and putting them under justice.

However please, be fair in exposing the opposition’s acheivement if any and failures during the same term.

Please read # 17, 21 and 27. You could not add anything over what I already mentioned. If there is something that has not been mentioned, please let me know. I’ll add that on.

You, living in USA may not, but people back home had nightmares of Tareque Zia on a regular basis. With skyrocketing price of essentials and regular load sheddings, they didn’t have any scope to have sweet dreams with Tareque Zia.

Three other major achievements include Phulbari, Kansat and Mirpur. But 43 doesn’t have the same ring as 40. Can we subtract three Tareques? That would still leave a quadruple dose… And where do we stand on the 2005 ban on smoking in public places? Can we swap one more Tareque?

If we take Najmul Huda as a sample of KZ’s cabinet, we can have some idea about how their minds work and how lame they are.

The following are from the BBC program “Can Democracy Deliver” where Najmul Huda had the opportunity to tell his side.

On issues of religious freedom, women entpreneurship etc NH repeatedly mentioned that Bangladesh constitution provided all those freedom. At one point Mahfuz Anam who participated from London said “it’d be nice if the governing party would follow the constitution”.

On corruption issue NH said every country has it (corruption). In case of BD the foreign aid is making the corruption go worse. (If foreign aid will stop)..when there is nothing to give, there is nothing to receive.

Govt set up Anti Corruption Commission, which hasn’t been able to operate (in more than 2 years) because reporters are always been badgering them with questions. (audience broke into laughter at this point)

Criticism will always exist because there’s democracy (on why his government was so much criticized)
On the issue of Islamic militia (and BNP’s alliance with Jamati) NH said that the western media has over emphasized it NH said that there are good Muslims and good Christians…there are bad Muslims and bad Christians..There is political convenience and inconvenience.

(Your) AIM IN POLITICS IS TO COME TO POWER.
(At this point the moderator Steve asked “So the alliance with Jamati is a marriage of convenience?”)
Yes, of course.

Here is my comment now – some of these points may have already been mentioned. I will refrain from coming up with a final verdict not having the agenda of the government for the term and related facts. I am just jotting down the points, both negatives and positives that made an impression on me and the ones I can remember easily:

Positives
:: Pollution reduction by banning two-stroke engines and making way for alternatives like CNG run engines.
:: Clamping down on extremist outfits like JMB.
:: Ban on smoking in public places.
:: Introduction of RAB to curb crime which resulted in many successful captures of top criminals.
:: Banning polythene bags and making way for biodegradable alternatives like jute/paper based bags.
:: Modernization of the capital starting from the airport to many shopping outlets to various entertainment options to housing though much of it doesn’t matter to the commoners.

Negatives
:: Widespread corruption – not sure if overall corruption rate rose but it surely didn’t decline.
:: Uncontrolled price rise of essentials goods.
:: Traffic jam due to lack of urban planning.
:: Escalating problem related to power and electricity shortage.
:: Escalating residential water crisis in rich and poor areas alike.
:: People killed in so called RAB crossfire making RAB a double edged sword.
:: Unsolved mystery attack on AL that took lives of Ivy Rahman and others.

Friendly Disclaimer: Positive and negatives points are my own view based on my own observation and news on major media outlets. The points may very well be missing important items which I either missed or did not follow. Weight of each point and their importance may vary from individual to individual so simply adding them up for a verdict is not recommended.

I have just re-read Rumi’s carefully phrased point 21. This outfit is a human rights problem. It needs to be “problematised” as Rehan does, to an extent, in the post above. However sadly there are many admirers of unaccountable jack-booted men in uniform and men with guns in Bangladesh and on this site…!